The life and times of a motoring and motor rallying journalist in Scotland

Friday, 9 February 2018

Rally - No-snow Snowman

To-morrow’s
six forest stages on the Arnold Clark Snowman Rally are virtually snow-free
although there is a good stretch of ice over the Ben Wyvis 4th test.
Will it polish or will it break up? Well have to wait and see. But with showers
predicted overnight who knows what tomorrow will bring?

Although the sun shone all day in the Inverness area the
minute it dipped below the horizon the temperatures plunged. So how cold did it
get? Put it this way, it must have been too cold for polar bears because none
were spotted raiding the bins behind McDonalds.

Even so, it would be a brave or foolish pundit who would try
and predict the winner tomorrow even if the stages don’t cut up and remain firm
and fast all day for all runners.

If that’s the case then Mike Faulkner and Bruce McCombie in
their Mitsubishis will be in with a shout. The Lancers may not be quite as
nimble as the R5s but they are faster. And with no Garry Pearson that puts
Donnie MacDonald in the frame but he’ll have to keep an eye on Mark McCulloch.

Mark almost had a deal in place to run a Mitsubishi Mirage
R5 but it didn’t happen and so at the last minute a deal was done to run a Dom
Buckley Fiesta R5. Not having managed to get anything like a wee test, Mark’s
only experience of the car was a 2 mile run along the road this evening to
Scrutineering!

There will be some Subaru heavy metal around as well.
Quintin Milne has an S11 and Fred Milne has a 12b but Q is suffering from a
bout of that most debilitating of all illnesses, man-flu. He was last seen
seeking compassion and a cuddle from one B WatsonEsq, aka, the Sheriff. Bad move.

Shaun Sinclair was a late entry but at a test earlier today
the boys had to take the gearbox out to change a sensor because “the front end
wasn’t talking to the back end!” And you won’t find that fault in a Prodrive or
a Haynes Manual.

As ever, for a stage by stage account of progress tomorrow,
check out the Results on Brian Thomson’s ‘FlyingFinish.co.uk’ webpage and I’ll
keep my ear to the ground for scuttlebutt and tall tales.